Man burns to death in Sabarimala: As protests over SC verdict lose steam, Kerala BJP uses issue to attack Vijayan govt

BJP alleged that the 49-year-old killed himself disheartened with the Left Democratic Front government’s handling of the Sabarimala issue. The party has insisted that 49-year-old Venugopalan Nair, who allegedly set himself on fire at around 2 am on 13 December was an Ayyappa devotee and he had resorted to the extreme step, disheartened with the Left Democratic Front government’s handling of the Sabarimala issue. However, the dying declaration given by Nair before he succumbed to the burn injury at the Trivandrum Medical College Hospital around 4 pm has no mention about Sabarimala shrine and the ongoing protests against the entry of menstruating women in the hill shrine, according to police. “Nair was a strong devotee of Ayyappa and he used visit Sabarimala on the 1st of every month,” Ramesh said adding that Nair had not visited the party’s protest venue before. ‘We need to do something drastic to lift the morale of the cadres’, say BJP workers The suicide by the Thiruvananthapuram native has come at a time the indefinite hunger strike that the party launched in front of the secretariat since 1 December had started losing steam after the political focus shifted to the electoral debacle that the party suffered in the assembly election in the five states, especially in the Hindi heartland.